A Good Man is Hard to
Find
By
Flannery O’connor
(first published in 1953)
1
Flannery O’connor
(1925-1964)
http://library.gcsu.edu/~sc/foc.html
• American author
• Born in Savannah,
Georgia
– Bible belt
• Catholic
background
• Attended Georgia
State College for
women
2
Flannery O’connor
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/flannery.htm
• Wrote in Southern
gothic tradition
• Combined comic with
tragic and brutal
• Was profoundly
influenced by the
spiritual nature of the
region in which she
lived
3
Types of Conflict
• Person vs. person
• Person vs. self
• Person vs. God
• Person vs. Nature
• Find evidence of each type.
4
Movement of Events
• Exposition
– Family discusses trip to
Florida.
– Children are rude and cynical.
– Grandmother doesn’t want to
go.
• Complication
–
–
–
–
The Tower Restaurant
June Star is rude.
Discussion of “The Misfit”
Title line occurs.
• Climax
– The murders
– Grandmother’s and Misfit’s
epiphanies
• Denouement
– “It’s no real pleasure in life.”
5
Natural Setting
—both friendly and hostile
• Georgia roadside
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Stone Mountain
sparkling trees
child waving
private cemetery with 5 or 6 graves
moderate temperature
deserted back road outside Toomsboro
woods
6
Man-made Setting
Both friendly and hostile
• The family’s house
– Arguing goes on there between children and
Grandmother.
• The car
– Stories from Grandmother and fighting of children
– The accident
• The Tower Restaurant
–
–
–
–
Filling station/dance hall
Outside Timothy, Georgia
“Tennessee Waltz”
Monkey
7
Major Characters
• Protagonist =
Grandmother (developing)
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Dresses like a lady
Values orderliness
Is practical
Forgetful
Tells stories
Is good-hearted
Believes in Jesus
Gives and receives grace
in the end
• Antagonist = The Misfit
(developing)
–
–
–
–
–
–
Looks like a scholar
Is driving a hearse
Polite
Speculative
Rejects Christ
Perceives and rejects
grace
– Loses pleasure in
meanness
8
Minor Characters
• Spiritually undeveloped
– Bailey Boy
• Easily manipulated
• Wears parrot shirt
– His wife
• Remains unnamed
• Resembles a rabbit or
cabbage
– John Wesley and June Star
• The children
• Disrespectful to adults
• Hiram and Bobby Lee
– The Misfit’s boys
• Red Sammy
– Owns Barbecue
– Laments lack of goodness
in people
• Red Sammy’s wife
– Remains unnamed
– Polite
– Distrustful of husband
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“A Good Man is Hard to Find”
• Title
– Refers to every person’s need for grace.
– Note similarity between “Good Man” and
“Young Goodman Brown.”
• Point of View
– Third person limited through
Grandmother’s eyes
10
Major and minor symbols abound.
• Names of people
and places
– John Wesley
• Major religious figure
• Wrote and preached
about grace
– Red Sammy
• Devil figure
• Sees only evil in
mankind
– Lack of names in
some
• Most of the men and
boys have names but
no women except for
June Star.
– The Misfit
• Rejects social and
moral norms
– Toomsboro
• Foreshadows death of
family
11
Other Symbols
• Animals
– Monkey
• a symbol for the devil and many vices
– Cat
• also associated with the diabolical
• Clings to Bailey “like a caterpillar”
– Signifying transformation?
• Rubs against Misfit
– Parrot and rabbit
• Bailey Boy and wife
• both passive and irresolute
12
More Symbols
• The Color Red
– Red Sammy
• Devil image
– Bobby Lee’s red shirt
– Misfit’s red eyes and
ankles
• brutality
• Evil
• impotence
• Physical positions
– Bailey Boy
• In sprint position but doesn’t
move
• Leans against a “gray, naked
pine trunk
– Cross image?
– Is Bailey transformed at the
end in his confrontation with
death?
• Cat clings to his neck
– Bailey is always acted upon
– But this could ironically be
the act that saves him
13
Other Symbols
• Physical Positions
(cont.)
– Grandmother
• Begins by looking down
on Misfit
• drops hat
– resignation
• Dies smiling and
looking up
– In a state of grace
• Foreshadowing
– Cemetery with 5 or 6
graves
– “Woods gaped like a
dark mouth”
• Snake image
– “sprang back as
though a snake had
bitten him”
14
The need for and availability of grace
• Like Hawthorne, O’connor explores the
evil nature of mankind. But for her,
although evil abounds, grace does as
well. Every person needs grace. Every
person can have it.
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